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Kohl Elementary 5K

At GZ‘s kid’s elementary school, they host a 5K. The school is walking distance from their house. This was the 2nd annual race raising money for some gym improvements. And when last weekend’s Longmont 5k didn’t work with my schedule, I got itchy so I registered for this one. It only helped that Brownie was taunting me to run it over on his blog. He is up 2-1 on me so I might even the score.

I normally get pretty anal about races but this was pretty laid back for me. I only tapered by running one time the day before and already had 70 miles on my legs for the week when lining up. The goal was simple. Run faster than my current PR. My 5Ks are not impressive and are clearly not my forte. I don’t train for them. I never set foot on a track. I don’t even know what an interval is anymore. So this was just run hard for a short period of time.

Race morning was in the 30s but it was dry and crisp. Singlet! The competition got cold just looking at me. One dude was shirtless but he just looked silly today. Unless he was from the arctic. Lucho was in attendance and I hadn’t expected to see him there. Always enjoy talking with him. Met Aaron and his family there. Super nice. JV showed up as we were getting ready to get started to cheer us on. Or maybe he just wanted to see how I did in those Mizuno Wave Universe 4s that he gave me. They were my weapon of choice today. He took the photos of the race for us. Its much better when he doesn’t run. 🙂

In retrospect, I probably shot off the line too fast and put myself in a little hole. There were all these people on the front line and I didn’t see a good slot so I slide behind. Standing next to people in row 2 talking about “breaking 30”. More power to you but let’s organize the start a bit. No mats for a chip start so everyone has to be up front.

Anyway, mile 1 reminded me why the 5K isn’t my favorite. Ouch? Actually, everything felt pretty good surprisingly. Just breathing a lot harder than I do day to day. Leg turnover seemed OK but definitely could be improved if I was to get faster at shorter distances. GZ was just ahead of me. But then I saw that damn hat in a shadow coming up behind me and then Brownie made the move and passed me. I was sort of glad because I figured he had me today and now I don’t have to look over my shoulder all race. GZ suddenly did a U-turn and went back past me to go finish the run with his son. Guess I don’t have him to chase either. These two events turned off some of the pressure but I was there to see what I could do without simulation.

Heading into mile 2, we had a slight upward slope followed by a nasty headwind that wasn’t conducive to fast 5K speeds. Somebody said it was 20 MPH. No clue. The consensus was that the winner was about 20-30 seconds off his normal pace so maybe that was the baseline factor today. Oh well. Stuck through it and as we made a few turns it backed down and my speed came back. I was able to lock back in the pace from mile 1 for mile 3. It was cool to see the pace start with 5:XX on the watch. Those are probably my two fastest race miles ever.

Picked off some folks on the way back to the finish. Held strong around the school. Back into the headwind for the sprint to the finish. Saw some dude coming up behind me in the shadow and I started flying. It was an all out pace for me and I held him off at the line. Felt tired at the end but mostly just breathing really hard. Legs were fine.

Wore my monitor as I really wanted data from this event to see how things are progressing. Some split data from the GPS:

Mile 1 – 5:54 – 154 bpm

Mile 2 – 6:34 – 164 bpm

Mile 3 – 5:56 – 166 bpm

Last .1 – 0:57 – 167 bpm – 5:51 pace

That middle mile screwed up the race for me. Not sure if I could have held but I like to think so. That would drop 30 second and put sub-19. That’s where I think I belong right now. So I think I am happy given what I had to work with today. Some sharpening at this distance and racing a few more of them (this was my 5th 5K ever!) and I might be able to break down some more. The other thing is that I don’t know how to warm up for this type of race. I can peel off some quick miles in a 10 mile effort towards then end when warm. But here, I am probably going in too cold and that makes it hurt worse than it has to.

Max HR overall was 175 bpm while the average was 161 bpm. Happy with that max but very poor on the average. 160 is/was my measured LT threshold. That means I was just above it for the race. LT should be able to be held for 60 minutes. Couldn’t run 60 minutes at this pace! But I have traditionally had trouble getting my HR to spike like others can. It stays away from those peak values. Maybe that’s just how I work but I like to think I have an untapped region of HR that I just can’t figure out how to get into. Or do I subconsciously hold myself back because I don’t like the feeling much higher than 160s? Who knows.

Well, that was too much analysis for a 5K but it was pent up. It was good to get out there and get rid of some of that “fear of racing” that has been building. I set a new PR in the 5K so I at least have some concrete proof that I am in some ways faster than this time last year…even if I have trouble convincing myself of that day to day.

Anyway, fun morning and I was glad to see the guys again. The secret 3.8 oz orange shoes might have helped but I still suffered the loss. Maybe I should start drinking more.

I went 3.16 miles with an elevation gain of 66 feet in 00:19:22, which is an average pace of 06:07. Heart rate average was 161. View my GPS data on Garmin Connect.